I once knew a woman who told her son, “You can be right or you can be kind.” Her son was very argumentative because he always chose wanting to be right. At her funeral, her son shared with the audience that looking back maybe he should’ve chose being kind like his mom did. It’s amazing how easy … [Read more...]
Nice-oholic Pt 19: Can We Trust Jesus was even Real?
Last week I claimed the nicest thing we can do for ourselves is consider what happens in the next life and used Pascal’s Wager and my own list as a starting point. Because it’s so important, let’s go a step further by looking at Jesus from a historical standpoint. After all, we need to understand … [Read more...]
Nice-oholic Pt 16: The Different Types of Mean
The other day my oldest said that a boy at school told her that Santa wasn’t real... you know, like a jerk. Why do people try to ruin good things for others? Oh, right. It’s because they want to think they’re the smart one. It’s just like a conspiracy theorist: “Only I know the truth because I’m … [Read more...]
Nice-oholic Pt 15: The Different Types of Nice
In the last lesson we looked how being too nice to ourselves is connected to selfishness and vanity, which brings us to an important point: Being a nice-oholic doesn’t mean you’re a good person. It means you have an addiction that needs to be addressed. No matter what kind of nice-oholic you are, … [Read more...]
Nice-oholic Pt 13: Is God even Nice?
In the last lesson we considered how God isn’t a nice-oholic by looking at how He doesn’t answer all of our prayers because He’s not a cosmic Santa. Instead, He’s a loving parent who disciplines His children because He’s more worried about making us good people rather than making us spoiled. When … [Read more...]
Nice-oholic Pt 12: Is God a Nice-oholic?
Is God a nice-oholic? There’s an interesting question. I think everyone at some point has at least wanted God to be a nice-oholic: “God, I have this thing I really want… You’re going to give it to me right? You say You love me, so You have to… don’t You?” Unfortunately, it’s easy to forget that … [Read more...]
Nice-oholic Pt 11: Dealing with Shame
One of the greatest struggles for nice-oholics (and others) is dealing with shame. Like all of our emotions, shame is a gift from God (there’s a fun thought). In its proper form, shame is meant to be a threat of repercussion to keep us from doing really dumb things. It’s like the threat of being … [Read more...]
Nice-oholic Pt 10: Finding Healing through Understanding
I was recently listening to some early 2000s Alternative music (aka modern classical music) and Simple Plan’s “Perfect” came on, which is a song to a dad with the main lyrics being: “I’m sorry, I can’t be perfect.” I wonder how the band is now that they’re older and likely have kids of their own. … [Read more...]